Understanding Mental Blind Spots

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Have you ever spent time looking for something only to discover it was right in front of you? If you answered yes, then you’ve experienced what’s known as a mental blind spot. Believe it or not, you experience these mental blind spots everyday. Here’s an experiment to illustrate just how they work.

We’ll start with an exercise to demonstrate the power of mental blind spots. Take a minute and carefully look at and read the following phrase. Count all the “F’s” in this sentence:

FINISHED FILES ARE THE RESULT OF YEARS OF SCIENTIFIC STUDY COMBINED WITH THE EXPERIENCE OF YEARS…

How many did you find? Most people see 3.

But honestly, there are 6 F’s. Yes, 6! You’ll want to go back and read the sentence again.

If after knowing there are 6 F’s and you still don’t see them, you’ve just experienced a mental blind spot. At the end of this article I have highlighted all six of the F’s.

Here’s what happened – When reading this sentence, the brain can’t seem to process the word “OF”.

Why? No one is absolutely sure but it could be because we pronounce the word “of” as “OV.” Our mind wants to see ov and not of.

Amazing isn’t it?

The concept of a mental blind spot began with Dr. Maxwell Maltz in his 1960 classic book, Psycho-Cybernetics. To this day it is still considered one of the most respected self-development books ever written.

Dr. Maltz discovered that even after a patient had had plastic surgery on the outer scars, they didn’t see any difference in their physical appearance. Dr. Maltz was amazed at how many patients couldn’t see the actual changes in their appearance. Their mind had formed a mental blind spot. This blind spot was so powerful it could not or would not register any improvement in their physical appearance. In the patient’s mind, they still looked and felt the same as they had before their plastic surgery.

A mental blind spot blocks or blanks out reality as it truly is. How does a mental blind spot form? We’ve programmed our mind to see the reality we’ve worked to create. We have programmed years and years of “reality” into our mind. The unconscious and conscious mind now believes and sees what we’ve told it to believe and see. We have literally programmed our mind to see the reality we’ve worked so hard to create.

We all have our own mental blind spots. You know, that blind spot that doesn’t see reality as it is. Could it be weight? Or ability? Or intelligence? Some mental blind spots are small and some are big. All blind spots distort our perceptions of reality.

The great news, you have the power to change your thinking and conquer the mental blind spots currently in your life. Change begins one small step of self-discovery at a time. Realizing you have a mental blind spot is step one!

Again, is the phrase with all of the “F’s” highlighted.FINISHED FILES ARE THE RESULT OF YEARS OF SCIENTIFIC STUDY COMBINED WITH THE EXPERIENCE OF YEARS…

Leave us a comment and let us know what you think about recognizing mental blindspots.

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